Old Faithful Oil Spill

How about it, huh? Too bad it wasn't as important as that polygamist dude from somewhere who was finally caught so they had to, THEY HAD TO put it on the front freakish page of the Daily Interlake yesterday because it affects us waay more than some stinking oil spill near Old Faithful. Thank-You for recognizing that, Editor Meile!

Hey , let's talk about them closing our public parks down, about Feorge Bush unilaterally deciding that every toilet that doesn't cleaned regurlarly will be bulldozed or turned over to private mamagement for more of our own money, maybe even sold off...

According to the coalition, no public or congressional review of the RSFMP policy has yet occurred. Although 22 Forests have completed five-year RSFMP site closure plans and implementation has begun, none of the plans have been publicly released. The coalition actually obtained two complete plans Deschutes and Tongass National Forests) and partial information about three more forests. From the data available so far the coalitions projects that between 3,000 and 5,000 recreation sites will be closed or decommissionedt , and as many as 4,000 more will be converted to fee sites or turned over to private for-profit concessionaires to manage.

I called the Northern Region offices of the FS in Missoula and talked to Terry Knupp, regional coordinator for this program. Clearly, the Northern Region is not the focal point of the coalition's criticism because the process is moving more slowly and cautiously. Also, Knupp assures that there are some plans to involve the public at least on site-specific decisions. "We have a responsibility to keep the public safe and to keep these sites healthy," Knupp points out. (how freaking cute is that???)

According to Knupp, national policy coming from the Bush Administration, not any Act of Congress or official administrative rule, is requiring the preparation of the RSFMP plans. The Northern Region (Montana and northern Idaho) plans to have the plans done be the end of next year. Standards have been set, Knupp explains, and each site must be operated to those standards. If there is a toilet at a trailhead, for example, it needs to be cleaned regularly.

If there isn't enough money in the budget to operate to standards, Knupp says some action must be taken, such as closing the recreation site, removing facilities, turning it over to a concessionaire, or getting volunteers to operate or clean the site. Another option is charging a fee, but unlike other FS regions, the Northern Region has been cool on this idea.

Also, apparently, the Northern Region is better off, budget-wise, than other regions. "It's early in the process, but right now it doesn't look like we will have to remove many facilities in order to operate to standards," Knupp predicts. "It doesn't look like we have to take drastic actions."

But the coalition report contains damning details from other regions. In Oregon's Deschutes National Forest, for example, only 14 out of 212 existing developed recreation sites will remain open and free to public use. The rest will be closed and obliterated, converted to fee sites or turned over to private concessionaires.

Ditto for three Colorado national forests where the same fate awaits 72 percent of the developed recreation sites.

The basic objective of the secret plans, according to the coalition, is to make all recreation sites "sustainable," which means they must generate enough income to pay for themselves. If not, they must be closed, obliterated or turned over to the private sector for management.

In the report's conclusion, coalition calls on national forest users to demand that the RSFMP plans be subjected to public comment and review as specified in the National Environmental Policy Act, just like forest management and travel plans. The group also called for Congress to scrutinize the program to ask for an audit of FS recreation spending compared to appropriated funds.

"It is imperative that this secret policy see the light of day," concluded Funkhouser. "This is a drastic change to National Forest recreation management that should not be allowed to proceed behind closed doors

some action must be taken

The ultimate convenience in a situation like that would be to have some big hearted millionaire come in and change all the rules for you. For your own good, of course.

Government. bad. sneaky. rich. people. good.

Now get nekkid and do that chicken dance again

Fiona

Yes, I did steal this picture of three day old Fiona (from October 2004), daughter of Jennifer and Jackson who were wild burros living on BLM land until their capture and eventual journey to their very good new home on Robert's organic farm in Kentucky well before Senator Burns decided to pull that dirty trick sneaking a rider that permitted using tax dollars to slaughter wild horses (often with illegal laborers) and ship the meat to foreign countries into the 2005 Omnibus Apprporiations Bill that was signed into law on December 08, 2004. Fiona, Jennifer and Jackson may not realize how lucky they were to get a home with Robert and Mary, but I know, and now you know too!

What Wealthy Foreigners Eat For Dinner

Guess this guy, as well as the President, would rather we all kill and sell the mustangs so they can pursue their own agendas. Well, I do believe we need to gang up on these people and explain about American Heritage. I read the other day that Israel is asking the U.S. to pay 450 million to install some checkpoints over there. Maybe we just funnel some of this wasted foreign affairs money back into our heritage and American West. First off, let's all get back to our respective congress-peoples and do some serious explaining about just WHO runs this country and just WHO does the voting. I am currently training a wonderful three-time loser mustang named Tooka. By this guys idea, Tooka would have been on a dinner plate in Europe and just fine with the dear Senator. I want you all to take a look at ALL of his pages on my web site. I want you to download one or two of the short videos of him and see just how wonderful this treasure is. Greed and laziness are the only reasons that thousands of good mustangs like Tooka will soon be slaughtered to please a pitiful handful of cattlemen who lease "Public Lands" from the BLM. What are YOU going to do about it? And, by the way, have you noticed how many horses area appearing in TV commercials lately? The American People LOVE horses !!

Congress sneaked the 'Burns rider' through in December 2004. It allows for the slaughter, for human eating, of Americas Wild Horses. If you treasure our ONLY National Heritage, the wild mustang and burro, then write your congressman and senator immediately

The Picture and the letter were taken off Robert's site without his knowlege or permission. I don't think that he would mind, especially if I follow up with more posts and a better explanation of why it matters.

What Happened to America's Can Do Attitude?

Let's pretend that we can understand and accept the idea that our very own government would rather they got to stay on vacation and eat cake than rescue thousands of drowning Americans; of course we can probably get over the idea that bloated dead bodies had to float in the streets of New Orleans for days on end because they were icky and gross and lazy dead people who would have helped themselves out if they really wanted to stop clogging up the gutters.

Now some people might start to question why a year and 44 billion dollars couldn't get the garbage picked up or get reliable electricity and running water to the area, but those would probably be the same losers who would want to know why we have left all those people displaced in situations that don't facillitatethem getting on their feet soon enough to help the rest of us figure out how we are going to manage our staggering debt, crumbling infrastructure, lack of industry before our creditors break through the doors.

Other people might whine about the war, the torture, their loss of privacy and yada yada yada, but I may have finally uncovered our greatest national shame to date:

The FBI has still not updated their most wanted list to include Osama Who for his role in 9-11 because it is too darn difficult or it was inconvenient. Maybe somebody could get off the couch long enough to tell the FBI where to find a 14 year old kid to take care of all that getting Osama Who and 9-11 in the same database or at least on the same 8 1/2x 11 piece of paper

Latest Sighting of Out of State Money

The random blogger gods have decided to let me in without explanation or apology, so I will share the view we have all been watching for the last several days minus the bright yellow airplane that has been flying it around the north end of town for hours on end. I am an avowed people watcher and it is very interesting to see how people's initial positive hopefulness about this banner turns into an annoyance about the intrusion when they figure out what it is.

Of course I wanted to know who is behind this expensive endeavor so I started asking questions. It turns out that I wasn't the only person who wanted to know what the devil was going on; when I asked enough people a photo showed up with a story about the same banner flying over Tampa in April of this year

(12 Apr 2006) Around noon today, two planes flew above USF's Tampa campus,
each one towing a sign. One plane's sign said "STOP THE WAR," and includes
some smaller text that said "10 week abortion," with the phone number
888-234-9292. This sign also had a picture of an aborted fetus' face. The
other plane's sign said "10 WEEK ABORTION," had the same phone number and a
picture. Mike Schrimsher, Florida Regional Director for the Center for
Bio-ethical Reform, said it was a picture of "A baby's arm that had been
torn off at the shoulder and wrapped around a dime."

The phone number led to a recording that identified the group as the
Reproductive Choice Campaign which, according to the message, "provides
alternatives to abortion or assistance with post-abortion grief." It lists
another toll-free number, 800-848-LOVE, and the website
http://www.abortionno.org. If you visit the website, be prepared for
gruesome pictures of aborted fetuses.

I learned that some women don't understand the difference between abortions and potato chips

October 22, 2005

When I was a young girl i had a friend who convinced me to have a few abortions. I never realized what they did and regret it. They should show these pictures before you have one.

Age: 30

They tell us why abortion is genocide, but not to worry about the mother because

The practice of abortion was revolutionized at virtually the same moment that the laws were revolutionized, through the widespread introduction of suction curettage in 1970. (Even before this, antibiotics and other advances had already dramatically lowered the abortion death rate.) Instead of scraping the soft wall of the pregnant uterus with a sharp instrument, the operator vacuums it out with a plastic suction curette. Though it is preferable that this be done by a licensed physician, one can expect that if abortion is ever driven underground again, even non-physicians will be able to perform this procedure with remarkable safety…. Even without a suction machine, a simple combination of catheter and syringe can produce enough suction to carry out a safe early abortion.

As for the self-induced abortion, by thrusting a coathanger or other dangerous object into the womb, this will also be a thing of the past.

Could it be that this out of state special interest group decide to take up residence in the Big Sky a mere ten weeks before the November election has an alternative agenda, and dare I look to the greatest Christians of all at Agape Press for the answer?

Is the Republican Party committed to pro-life causes? To many pro-lifer advocates, it is clear that the GOP is less pro-life than it has been in the past. Marjorie Dannenfelser of the Susan B. Anthony List has an idea why this is the impression being given. "I think the problem is a tremendous lack of education, combined with a boatload of cash by big, corporate bioethics firms," the pro-lifer leader offers. But even pro-lifers themselves, she points out, have trouble with some of the issues that have arisen from a high-tech society. "This bioethics [issue], this stem-cell research is new," she comments. "It kind of blindsided us a couple years ago, and it is complicated. It's very hard for a lot of people to weave in and out of the intricacies of it." But Dannenfelser says she still has faith in most members of the Republican Party. "I think we can say we are a pro-life party, we still have a pro-life plank," she says. "That isn't going to be going anywhere." She wants to see more education on issues such as stem-cell research so people will be able to make more-informed decisions in the future -- and she would like to see more pro-life action from the GOP and the White House. [Bill Fancher]